The answer isn’t as straightforward as you’d think
Booking a seat on a plane using Avios isn’t complicated, but calculating the number of points that you need is. Here’s a breakdown of the ways that the points required are calculated and how you can leverage some factors to decrease the points cost.
British Airways: Points needed for reward flights
The number of points you need for a BA flight is based on a number of factors:
- Where are you flying from, and to
- The time of year (is it peak or off-peak)
- Are you using a voucher (e.g. a BA Companion Voucher)
- Which cabin are you flying in (e.g. Economy or First Class)
- And finally, the split between Avios and cash.
Understanding the points needed to fly from one city to another
Firstly, BA uses a distance-based approach to points. This means that the Avios required are based on the miles between city A and city B. This is a simple approach, but when you’re thinking about a journey, you won’t typically have an idea of how far apart the airports are.
BA Avios reward flight zones
Below you can see the table for return flights, split by zone and cabin class. I’ve also listed the peak and off-peak point requirements.
| Zone | Economy (Peak/Offpeak) | Prem Economy (Peak/Offpeak) | Business (Peak/Offpeak) | First (Peak/Offpeak) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 (1 mile to 650 miles) | 4,750 / 5,250 | NA | 8,500 / 9,750 | NA |
| 2 (651 to 1,151 miles) | 7,250 / 8,250 | NA | 13,500 / 15,750 | NA |
| 3 (1,152 to 2,000 miles) | 9,250 / 10,750 | NA | 17,750 / 18,350 | NA |
| 4 (2,001 to 3,000 miles) | 10,000 / 12,500 | NA | 31,250 / 37,500 | NA |
| 5 (3,001 to 4,000 miles) | 13,000 / 20,000 | 26,000 / 40,000 | 50,000 / 60,000 | 68,000 / 80,000 |
| 6 (4,001 to 5,500 miles) | 16,250 / 25,000 | 32,500 / 50,000 | 62,500 / 75,000 | 85,000 / 100,000 |
| 7 (5,501 to 6,500 miles) | 19,500 / 30,000 | 39,000 / 60,000 | 75,000 / 90,000 | 102,000 / 120,000 |
| 8 (6,501 to 7,000 miles) | 22,750 / 35,000 | 45,500 / 70,000 | 87,500 / 105,000 | 119,000 / 140,000 |
| 9 (7,001 miles upwards) | 32,500 / 50,000 | 65,000 / 100,000 | 125,000 / 150,000 | 170,000 / 200,000 |
If you want to know exactly how many points you need to a specific destination, then use my guide to how many points you need to fly to X. This allows you to see the exact points required for every city that BA flies to (and from) as well as the breakdown by peak/off-peak and cabin class.
Peak vs Off-Peak dates
Flying on a peak day will require more points than flying on an off-peak day. BA make it easy to see which dates are peak or off-peak during the booking process and I created a breakdown of all the peak and off-peak dates for 2025 and 2026.
It’s worth saying that there are just 127 peak days in 2025, representing less than 35% of all dates. Most peak dates are in the Summer, with December also being quite a peak-heavy month. The difference an off-peak date can make to your Avios is significant.
If you’re flying in first, the difference could be up to 60,000 per couple on a return flight. Even on short-haul flights, flying off-peak represents a 20% discount. That means for every five flights you’ve taken, you’d save enough points to take another flight.
Using a Companion or Cabin Upgrade Voucher
One of the easiest ways to reduce the number of points that you need for a flight is to utilise a voucher. The best-known of these is the BA Companion Voucher, which you can obtain through an American Express credit card by meeting a spend limit on an annual basis. Also known as a 2-4-1 voucher, it allows you to cut the number of points you need in half. Despite the name, you no longer need to fly with someone else to get that saving; solo travellers get the same benefits.
The Barclays Cabin Upgrade voucher is attained by either having a Barclaycard (and hitting a spend level in a year) or a Barclays Premier account. It is possible to have both, and therefore get two vouchers per year. The Cabin Upgrade voucher allows you to purchase tickets for one cabin (e.g., Premium Economy) and then be upgraded to the next cabin level.
Paying more money, but using fewer points.
At the end of the booking process, you’ll be asked how many points you want to use versus the cash element of the booking. By default BA will select the option that uses the most Avios points, and gives you the lowest amount of taxes. This is “Reward Flight Saver”, although it’s not really clear that it is.
If an Avios flight has Reward Flight Saver then you’ll see it marked with a blue cicle, as in the example booking below.
What exactly is Reward Flight Saver?
Firstly, this does not reduce the Avios you need. RFS allows you to use more Avios points to reduce the tax element of the booking. The “saver” in the name is related to the cash part of the booking rather than the number of points needed.
If you have more Avios than you need, you can get that tax element down. It’s actually a very efficient use of points and I wrote more about Reward Flight Saver, and how it can be useful.
What’s confusing with RFS is that once you get into the payment part of the booking, there’s no reference to it.
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